The Four Color Media Monitor

Variety announced that filmmaker Snyder's recent film project, Rebel Moon, is going to receive a prequel comic written by the overrated leftist Simone:

Zack Snyder‘s “Rebel Moon” space opera is getting a comic book prequel series based on the origin story of one its characters.

“Rebel Moon: Nemesis,” from Titan Comics, will tell delve into the story of the Netflix films’ cyborg sword master Nemesis, played on-screen by Doona Bae.

From award-winning writer Gail Simone and artist Federico Bertoni, the comic series will take place before Nemesis became a sword-wielding partly-mechanical assassin, and is described as an “action-packed and badass story in the style of a revenge western, in which an innocent woman finds herself in the path of Imperium soldiers who slaughter her family.”

This sounds vaguely like the premise of Conan spinoff Red Sonja's origins, and Simone was one of the assigned writers in the past. But she's so leftist and even woke in her own way that it's just not worth the effort. Besides, this is obviously just another example of a story built upon darkness, and it's getting tiresome coming from Snyder too. Also note that it's another product coming from PC-influenced Netflix, and that can also say all you need to know what a ripoff this can be.

Labels: indie publishers, moonbat writers, msm propaganda, violence

Reuters reports the superhero Captain Canuck, originally created in the 1970s, has been revived just because a certain resident of Canada doesn't like Trump's tarrif policies:

U.S. President Donald Trump’s annexation threats and tariffs have breathed new life into a superhero from the 1970s – Captain Canuck, a government agent with inhuman strength who defends Canada's sovereignty.

"All of a sudden Canadians are looking to Captain Canuck as a symbol. And it's basically, to them, Captain Canuck symbolizes independence,” said Richard Comely, 74, the artist who co-created the comic book character.

[...] Comely said he created the character at a moment when he thought Canadians wanted their own icon, given that the United States had Captain America.

"I think there was an undercurrent, so to speak, in Canada in the '70s. So I think Canadians were starting to feel like, you know, like they should acknowledge the fact that we had our own country, and we had our own culture and be proud of the fact that we were Canadians," Comely said.

Well gee whiz, it's great to take pride in nationality, but that doesn't mean you should act as though what your neighboring country is doing is automatically wrong. Especially considering all the disastrous policies Canada took up over the past decade or so under leftist politicians like Justin Trudeau. Is that something to be proud of?

Comely said his original storyline envisioned Canada as a world power that faces challenges from groups seeking to infiltrate, destabilize and take over the country.

“Of course, never, never in any of those stories was it America that was going to be taking over Canada,” Comely said.

For the cover of Captain Canuck’s 50th anniversary issue, Comely depicted the superhero wagging his finger at Trump, who has said he wants Canada to become a U.S. state.

"It's got a lot of Canadians, you know, thinking about their identity as Canadians and feeling more united as Canadians. We feel like, okay, we've got to stand in opposition to these proposals," he said.

[...] Comely said he has received more calls from Canadian companies that have expressed “keen interest” in the fictional character due to the political tensions between the two neighboring countries.

"So in a sense, we have Mr. Trump to thank for a bit of resurgence," he said.

And why exactly does Trump matter, but not earlier presidents like Barack Obama and Joe Biden? They had plenty of disasters and other failings that could've been damaging for Canada by extension, yet we're told only when somebody like Trump comes along with specific policies, it suddenly matters? Please. And about Trump wanting "annexation"? I would assume that's just a form of jest, and considering how poorly Canadian country leaders of recent handled specific issues, what's the point of worrying about what Trump says, and not what a leftist like Trudeau does? To think, that a comic that was presumably not intended as something overtly political in the Bronze Age would be brought back for this. Comely is only souring his legacy and creation, much like Jim Starlin recently did with Dreadstar. When even a creator-owned comic is put to use for heavy-handed politics and ultra-cheap topics, it taints the comic's own legacy. And that's sadly what Comely and Starlin have done with their creations.

Labels: indie publishers, moonbat artists, msm propaganda, politics

In this Newsarama interview on Yahoo Entertainment, Mark Waid talks about DC's new variation on Marvel's "One World Under Doom", here being a Justice League story spotlighting Gorilla Grodd as a prime adversary:

The past and present of the DC Universe are colliding in the upcoming story We Are Yesterday, in which Justice League Unlimited and Batman/Superman: World's Finest will crossover as heroes of multiple eras take on Grodd, the psychic gorilla warlord, and his new/old incarnation of the Legion of Doom.

Mark Waid is writing both titles, and along with artists Travis Moore, Clayton Henry, Dan McDaid, and Dan Mora, he's crafting a four part event that brings the underrated Grodd to the forefront, pulling together threads that have been dangling throughout his Justice League Unlimited run as well as World's Finest.

Well he's doing so far too late, though it's worth noting Geoff Johns' take on Grodd from the early 2000s was very poor, and made the anthropomorphic ape look more like a violent brawler - and potentially carnivorous - than a cunning master planner for world conquest. That told, a company wide crossover spanning issues from every possible title is not the way to go, and if that's the case here too, they're only perpetuating a bad farce by keeping on with something they know perfectly well only makes it harder to afford on the one hand, and takes away stand-alone storytelling value on the other. And as for "underrated", even there, writing merit must apply before making the argument.

Newsarama: Mark, We Are Yesterday is the first big Justice League crossover of the current era of the DC Universe. Contrasting that with the final event of the previous status quo, Absolute Power, this story feels like a much more straightforward hero vs. villain story with the League taking on Grodd. How did you come to this concept as the way to go for this story?

Mark Waid: It actually began with the fact that World's Finest #38 and #39 and Justice League Unlimited #6 and #7 needed different artists to give the regular artists time to catch up. So I said, well, let's make it special. Let's do something where those four issues don't feel like fill-ins in their big events.

It sprang from that, and then I realized, OK, I need a menace big enough. Who can we get? Well, the Legion of Doom makes sense… Except they're not around in the current day. So how do we fix that? Everything became a domino toppling over another domino. And when it's all said and done, we've got a story.

Well gee, isn't Darkseid from the New Gods a pretty good example for a formidable warlord? I'm sure the Legion of Super-Heroes has some examples too. But again, under the kind of management DC's had for too long, corporate or otherwise, this just won't work out, and won't be as "special" as Waid wants it to be.

You've done stories that connect the past and future of the DC Universe before - I'm thinking of the Devil Nezha arc that led into Lazarus Planet, for example. In the case of We Are Yesterday, the connection is even more direct between past and present. What led you to want to bring these two timelines together in such a tangible way?

Well, like you said, I like doing that with World's Finest to remind people that it is not an Elseworlds. It is not, you know, it is not out of continuity. Even though it takes place a few years ago, we remind you every once in a while that it has a place in the DC Universe. So that was my starting point. But then I started thinking about Grodd and his motivations and his goals. You know, Grodd wants something big. I mean, he's got to take on the entire Justice League Unlimited. So to do that, he really wants to put the band back together, right? But he can't really. Luthor's reformed. Sinestro is off planet. You know, Joker is god only knows where - there's no way to put them together the way they are today.

But he, with the help of Airwave, he realizes he can put them back together, back in the day, go to them and say, "I got news for you. I'm from the future, and not much happens in the next five years. You know, you don't make a whole lot of headway. As a matter of fact, you lose a lot of ground. So why don't you come with me to the present day, and we will shake things up."

And here's something very sad about this story: Airwave, the hero whom, IIRC, is a cousin of Hal Jordan/Green Lantern with a similar name, is being turned criminal, just like GL himself was in 1994. More on that soon. For now, let me note it's obviously laughable if they want to depict Lex "reformed", because that was already done with the Green Goblin 15 years ago in one of Marvel's crossovers (Siege), and was nothing more than a forced storyline for the sake of suddenly depicting a scummy villain as a goody.

I'm glad you brought up Grodd, because I feel like he's such an underrated villain, with so much potential to be this kind of mastermind at the heart of a threat to the entire DC Universe. I just want to talk a little bit about Grodd and how you came to him as the main threat here. Obviously you have a long history with his arch-enemy the Flash.

Well, I mean, it made sense to me, in that I like Grodd's motivation. Grodd's motivation is, humans keep screwing up the world. So why do we have them? Let's make it not just Gorilla City, but Gorilla Planet.

I'm also reflective of the fact that he was Flash's first really big villain. People don't remember that he appeared in three consecutive issues of Flash. When he first appeared, Mirror Master was showing up like every five issues, and you know, Captain Boomerang is showing up every 10 issues, but Grodd right off the bat was meant to be his arch-enemy, and that's kind of fallen by the wayside over the years.

So let's get that back on the table, because he is a lot more powerful than most people give him credit for, especially now that his powers have augmented to the point where he is now the most powerful telepath and mentally powered character in the DC universe.

Ahem. There is potential to depict Grodd as a formidable villain in such stories, but not if the writing is terrible, and Waid hasn't exactly proven himself the best writer in years already. And as for claiming "nobody remembers"? That's not the case. Rather, it's if nobody knows the history or does the research. I have some Silver Age Flash archives (and someday, might be able to replace them with the new DC Finest archives), so I'm familiar with some of this history. Perhaps if Waid were to encourage audiences to look for reprint archives, then we could be getting somewhere in terms of story knowledge, but I guess he'd rather everybody pay more attention to his modern writing than that of the past, including his own 90s Flash stories. And as for augmentation, I assume that's alluding to a more recent storyline, but again, DC's output has been worthless for 2 decades now. And now, here's the sad part about where Waid took a certain minor player, whom I think was created by the late Denny O'Neil in the late 70s:

Back to We Are Yesterday, this story is happening in part because the Justice League were betrayed by someone they trusted. Airwave.

Sadly true.

Yes, sadly true and sad for Airwave. I like that character. I hope it's not the last we'll ever see of him here.

That's really a shame, isn't it?

Grodd was pretty ruthless.

Yes.

What I want to ask though is, how will what's happening in this story and what happened with Airwave affect the Justice League Unlimited mission going forward, with this massive roster and the way they've been approaching heroes and building out the ranks?

They are going to have to re-examine their protocols, and they are going to have to be a little more judicious about vetting the candidates. At first it was, let's throw the doors open to everybody, which was a good instinct. But Superman trusts everybody. You know you have to earn Superman's mistrust, whereas Batman is the exact opposite. You have to earn Batman's trust. And Wonder Woman is somewhere in the middle. So this is going to spill out into a confrontation between all three of them, which, by the way, gives me the idea for issue 10, which is great. I should write this down real quick.

This is another example of a "hero gone bad" story that's become very irritating, mainly because of how obvious it is that, because Airwave's a minor character, they think that alone makes it instantly okay to exploit him like tissue paper and turn him into a criminal, all because they believe not a single person who reads this will give a damn. It's also supremely silly at this point how Superman's depicted as more naive than trying to judge by personal character, and couldn't his superpowers make it possible for Kal-El to detect whether somebody's lying, or couldn't there be a story written where he builds a lie detector? Or, where WW uses her enchanted lariat to determine anything? If I'm correct, her creator William Marston invented an early version of polygraphs in his time. For now, what matters is how writers like Waid keep sticking to some very absurd traits for the heroes in focus, all for the sake of shoving them into a conflict, and if memory serves, this kind of insulting direction was also taken during the Infinite Crisis crossover too, in an example of forced storytelling where heroes are clashing with each other, with the worst part being that at the time, it had what to do with the repulsive Identity Crisis. At the interview's end:

On that note, how will We Are Yesterday kind of set up what's coming next in the DC Universe? We've heard about a crossover with the JSA, the next stages of what's going on with the Omega Energy. How is We Are Yesterday a key to that?

How do I answer this? I mean, it's absolutely key to this. The events of We Are Yesterday are a complete story. I don't want to give anybody the impression that we're only giving you part of a story that leads into the next part that, leads into the next part, like you're never getting a sense of closure. It is a complete story, but there are consequences to it that will very much, starting with Justice League Unlimited #9, lead out into the next big happening in the DC Universe. So there is a definite connection there.

They vehemently refuse to stop relying so heavily on crossovers, and that's saying all one needs to know about what's long gone wrong with corporate-owned universes and their storytelling efforts. The interviewer, predictably, raises nary a query about whether this is a healthy practice, and indeed it's not. That Waid so willingly participates even remotely in these line-wide crossovers is telling too, explaining why he's long become irrelevant, and that this story with Grodd is in any ways a crossover is why it won't age well either.

Labels: crossoverloading, dc comics, Flash, golden calf of villainy, Green Lantern, history, Justice League of America, Justice Society of America, Legion of Super-Heroes, moonbat writers, msm propaganda

Entertainment Weekly (via The Daily Wire) interviewed the cast of the new Fantastic Four: First Steps, and it looks like, despite the mess the live action Snow White film from Disney turned out to be, both artistically and politically, the cast of the latest attempt at launching a FF movie looks like it'll get similar treatment. For example, here's what they say about Human Torch:

Johnny is Marvel's archetype of a "hothead" teenager, but what exactly that means has been open to interpretation over the years. In the 2005 and 2007 Fantastic Four movies, for instance, Chris Evans played the character as a skirt-chasing scallywag. Quinn wanted to do something different.

"He's a man that leads with a lot of bravado, which can be an affront sometimes. But also he's funny," Quinn says. "Myself and [Marvel Studios boss] Kevin [Feige] were speaking about previous iterations of him and where we are culturally. He was branded as this womanizing, devil-may-care guy, but is that sexy these days? I don't think so. This version of Johnny is less callous with other people's feelings, and hopefully there's a self-awareness about what's driving that attention-seeking behavior."

Johnny is the little brother of the Fantastic Four, Quinn notes. But that's not the only quality that defines him.

"He is really smart," Shakman says. "He's on that spaceship for a reason, and I think sometimes people forget that in various comic stories, he's been one of the most heroic of them, even if he's undercutting his heroism at every turn through humor. He's Sue's brother, which means they are cut from similar cloth."

Now it's sad enough if they're implying Johnny was portrayed as little more than abusive to women, but are they also implying it's wrong to depict him as a funny guy and hero simultaneously? By that logic, it was wrong to depict Spider-Man as a guy who made humorous wisecracks too. If the film doesn't depict Johnny dating/romancing girls, if at all, then it's getting nowhere fast. If they haven't given Fandral from Thor this kind of treatment yet, I hestitate to think what they'll do if they have another Thor movie in the works. And then, here's what Vanessa Kirby says about how she's portraying Sue Storm, the older sister and wife of Mr. Fantastic:

Achieving global political peace sounds only slightly harder than synthesizing the decades-long fictional history of Sue Storm. As Marvel's first female superhero, she been part of the Fantastic Four since its first issue — but back then, she carried the relatively demeaning codename of "Invisible Girl," could only turn herself invisible, and mostly functioned as a damsel in distress.

"If you played an exact '60s Sue today, everyone would think she was a bit of a doormat," Vanessa Kirby says. "So figuring out how to capture the essence of what she represented to each generation, where the gender politics were different, and embody that today, was one of the greatest joys of this."

Over the years, Sue evolved in several ways. Her abilities expanded from individual invisibility to control over electromagnetic light and force fields, making her arguably the team's most powerful member. At various times, she's become a mother, a leader, and a skimpily clad dominatrix named Malice. Synthesizing all these aspects into a single character was a lot of fun for Kirby, who says motherhood, in particular, became the key through-line. Indeed, Sue's pregnancy will play a significant part in the plot of First Steps.

"Matt and I were really aware that there hasn't really been a mother with a baby in these superhero archetypes women have been getting," Kirby says. "One of the things I love most from Sue's history is when she becomes Malice, and all her dark stuff comes out. I was obsessed with that chapter of her life. So I wanted to make sure that there were tones of Malice in there with her, that she wasn't just the stereotype of a goody, sweet mother."

Kirby continues, "I've always been really interested in the mess of femininity, and how can you be both? How can you be all the things? Not just the tough, invincible, powerful woman, but also a mother who gives birth, which is itself a superhero act. I love that these characters are real humans in a messy family who argue and try to work it out and get things wrong."

Well if she's going to depict Sue as a hybrid of a baddie, I'm not sure how that can be reconciled with a motherly role, let alone femininity. Predictably, this interview is ambiguous about how Sue went on to gain more than just invisibility powers, as the force shields came about 2 years later, she became less of a distressed damsel, and none of this came at the expense of femininity in her portrayals. So what's their point? I think Kirby and company are just filtering everything through a lens where they only see what they want to, and it doesn't sound like they're grateful to Lee and Kirby for what they created back in the day.

What's irritating in addition is how the citation of the Malice portrayal echoes the Phoenix Saga from X-Men. I knew something had gone wrong for years with how certain "auteurs" get their "inspiration", and this looks like it'll be the next botch to borrow from one of the most questionable storylines of the Bronze Age. It's also grating how Kirby sounds like she's going to play a "sexy villainess" stereotype. What's so great about that? If being a criminal is the only way they believe a woman can be allowed to be sexy, that's disturbing, as is the citation of darkness as inspiration. It says pretty much all you need to know what's bound to go wrong with the latest adaptation of a classic comic that's regrettably been run into the ground by Hollywoke. For all we know, darkness is bound to overshadow the light of the source material here.

Breitbart also notes:

Fantastic Four: First Steps already has one major red flag, with one of its stars — the overexposed Pedro Pascal (Game of Thrones, The Mandalorian, The Last of Us) — declaring “A WORLD WITHOUT TRANS PEOPLE HAS NEVER EXSISTED [sic] AND NEVER WILL,” then taunting fans who disagreed with his virtue signaling.

This of course is the sad result of studios failing to discipline the actors they hire, and provide clear instructions they're not to make divisive political statements during filming and promotion of the projects. With this kind of mix in the movie, I think it'd be best to skip this as much as the previous live action iterations. This latest looks to be the worst FF adaptation of all, and another insult to the legacies of Lee and Kirby.

Labels: Fantastic Four, history, marvel comics, msm propaganda, politics, women of marvel

Entertainment Weekly (via the Daily Wire) says some former staffers on the live action children's series Might Morphin Power Rangers (which was adapted to comics, if memory serves), including mogul Haim Saban's contributors, think the way they cast the Black and Yellow Rangers with Black and Asian performers was a "mistake":

One of the key creative minds behind Mighty Morphin Power Rangers is owning up to a pair of casting choices widely decried as racially insensitive.

While crafting the first season of the children's superhero crime-fighting series, "None of us are thinking stereotypes," said former Power Rangers head writer Tony Oliver, speaking on "Dark Side of the Power Rangers," the latest episode of Investigation Discovery's new docuseries, Hollywood Demons.

That's why he says that the series was able to get all the way to air — and run for two seasons — with "the Black character the Black Ranger and the Asian character the Yellow Ranger." Oliver says it took "my assistant who pointed it out in a meeting one day" to realize the glaring, stereotype-driven casting at the heart of the show. "It was such a mistake," he reflected. [...]

In a 2013 oral history of the series, Saban's co-creator Shuki Levi claimed that Jones and Trang's controversial casting "wasn't intentional at all. At that time, Haim and I were new to this country. We didn't grow up in the same environment that exists in America with regard to skin color. We grew up in Israel, where being a Black person is like being any kind of color. It's not something we talked about all the time. It wasn't a big issue."

As insufferable as I've found Saban's left-wing politics, it's regrettable that skin color has to be an issue at all, and if it's not an issue in Israel, why must it be so in the USA? Yet if they're leftist, then it's just like Saban - and Levi - to follow along with the leftist playbook, and say that to have the Black and Asian performers wear the black and yellow uniforms was nothing more than insulting and stereotypical. If Saban's going to be such a left-wing loyalist, then the PC answers provided either/both by him and his staffers is hardly surprising. It's vital to consider that when Stan Lee and Jack Kirby created Black Panther in 1966, they gave T'Challa a black costume, and that wasn't an issue in their time, so why did the Power Rangers staff suddenly have a problem with what they turned out? Answer: just so they can appease the modern PC crowd.

All that aside, Power Rangers isn't something I've ever cared for, and it's worth noting that a number of years ago, all for the sake of woke brownie points, a recent 2017 movie changed the Trini character to a lesbian, as if it were literally impossible to market the film without such a retcon (it was a box office failure, as the list on the bottom of this page notes). And wasn't some of the series' material borrowed from Japanese super-sentai programs? In that case, it's not an entirely original stateside production.

Labels: Black Panther, Europe and Asia, history, marvel comics, misogyny and racism, msm propaganda, politics

Comic Book Movie says Marvel's repeating the same momentary demise premise that was written up in the mid-2000s, when Thor and several other pagan deities were put in the grave briefly as Dan Jurgens was concluding his 1998-2004 run, and then they were resurrected when J. Michael Straczynski began his short but quite dreadful run:

Next month, Immortal Thor #23 by writer Al Ewing and artist Jan Bazaldua marks the beginning of Thor Odinson's last stand. A saga that's been building since Ewing started his acclaimed run on the series, this new arc finds Thor alone against the fury of the malevolent Gods of Utgard.

The omens can no longer be denied. The prophecy can no longer be delayed. The hour has come for the God of Thunder's demise!

The story concludes in Immortal Thor #25, on sale in July, featuring Justin Greenwood's art in his Marvel Comics debut. However, death means very little in the world of comic books, and the Marvel Comics press release confirms that we should "stay tuned on the months ahead" to learn about the next chapter of Ewing's run.

Whether Thor is revived or not, woke writer Ewing's helming is reason enough to avoid it. Why should we even be told a premise like this, which has long been little more than tabloid trash? They're just irritating purist fans with another example of desecrating Stan Lee's legacy for the sake of profiteering at the expense of all that was once great about Lee's writings in his time.

Labels: bad editors, golden calf of death, history, marvel comics, moonbat writers, msm propaganda, Thor

Sci-Fi Pulse interviewed Wes Eastin, the producer/director of Shopping for Superman, a documentary about specialty stores, and how he views the industry. And what was one of the earliest comics he'd read?

Nicholas Yanes: What was your first encounter with comic books? Was there a moment in which you realized you had fallen in love with this medium?

Wes Eastin: I remember having Action Comics 678. THEY SAVED LUTHOR’S BRAIN! and being endlessly entertained by the cover and the book itself. Plus, this was Superman, we’re talking about here. And then… they found a way to KILL SUPERMAN!? Oh man. I remember telling my mom and any adult that would listen, (candy cigar in mouth) “I need to know more! Great Caesar’s ghost, they’re killing a legend!”

Superman, Batman, and then the X-Men (thanks to the Fox Kids show), and Spider-Man were everywhere but I found it hard to keep track of everything from the grocery store and newsstand so I would end up reading a story here and there and have a cursory understanding of what was going on. I didn’t care, really, I loved it. Luckily, there were a lot of single-issue stories which let me enjoy things without having to collect multiple issues to follow a longer story. I wish there was more of that these days for the larger titles.

The added bonus to all of this was that not everyone seemed to like comic books back then, so it felt a little like something that was more for me than everybody else.

Not everyone likes comics today either, unless it's to serve as a political platform for leftism, or even movie material for merely profiteering off of at the original comics' expense. But all that aside, interesting he alludes to the early 90s stunt when DC editorial made it seem like they were killing off Superman, because, even if they did intend to revive him (though not for altruistic reasons), it was still very insulting to the intellect they'd subject an entire franchise to such a stunt, especially given that it wound up leading into a much worse one, Emerald Dawn and Zero Hour, which forcibly portrayed Hal Jordan/Green Lantern as a villain, and there were at least a few increasingly repulsive similarities to that atrocity that came along the following decade, where women were victimized by similar storylines (Identity Crisis and Avengers: Disassembled). I attribute some of that to the Phoenix Saga in X-Men, which decidedly didn't do comicdom any favors in the long run. Seriously, what's so great about a story where a heroine's turned into a madwoman and wipes out a billion beings in another solar system? Thank goodness that was retconned about 5 years later so it wasn't Jean Grey, though it's all been corrupted and taken apart again in some way or other since the turn of the century.

On the subject of stories spanning multiple issues, there's something I'm assuming Mr. Eastin did not clearly raise in the documentary, or maybe we'd be getting somewhere not only in terms of formatting, but also in terms of storytelling. If he'd acknowledge company wide crossovers - which The Death & Return of Superman was a product of, in a manner of speaking - did more harm than good ever since Jim Shooter set the ball rolling with since Secret Wars in 1984, and argue whythe time's come to quit with such dreadful nonsense, maybe we'd see more self-contained stories like what he found more engaging back in the day, but even then, a case must still be made why paperback/hardcover is still the more ideal way to go at this point, and the obsession with variant covers must cease as well, mainly because that alone does not guarantee a good story inside, and it's head-shaking how so much ink was wasted on variant covers that could've been put to use for wall paintings instead.

Yanes: While comic book intellectual properties are more popular than ever, comic books and comic book stores don’t have the same cultural presence. What do you think can be done to increase comic book sales and help make shops more popular?

Eastin: I think stores have made a really strong go of elevating their presence online and in their communities, but that’s not really enough to interest people who aren’t comics readers already.

I think a big help would be if publishers and studios like Marvel made more noise about comics that are coming out, already out, and related to the films they’re making; and could drive new readers in, but advertising books and collections would definitely be a great start.

Some shop owners have repeatedly asked why there aren’t TV ads for comics from publishers or streaming ads. I think that’s a big part of the problem. A great many people aren’t being inspired to say, “That looks cool! Where can I find that?” Another great way to make shops more popular? Watch/buy/recommend Shopping for Superman!

All kidding aside, advertising dollars from publishers and distributors that reach people outside of the established circles might actually help keep readers.

But what about entertainment value? And why not acknowledge how writing merit in the mainstream declined beginning in the 90s, and art merit went south too 15 years ago? Why not also admit ultra-leftist politics have also ruined much of the mainstream, and even independent comics aren't immune? Of course advertising's a vital component of selling, along with how and where to buy, but if there's no artistic merit, sales won't last. Maybe this also explains why the mainstream publishers for starters don't belong in the ownership of conglomerates, but if even independent publishers make no serious attempt to advertise in wider mediums, then obviously something's wrong there too.

Yanes: One of the arguments made in your documentary is that comic book stores are competing against Amazon. However, the number of independent bookstores as well as Barnes & Noble locations are increasing despite competition from Amazon. Why do you think comic book stores struggle to replicate the success currently experienced by other bookstores?

Eastin: Well, that’s an interesting comparison. Bookstores are traditionally very distinct from comic book shops in more than a few ways. Since they’re very different creatures, I don’t know if the comparison is entirely fair. (Isn’t it interesting that we value comics as much as non-graphical prose these days? Way to go comics!) I will say that the bulk of the material that you find in a comic shop isn’t just new issue floppies and of that inventory (cards, trades, toys, etc) Amazon offers a great deal of it at a lower rate with super-fast delivery. They literally undercut retailers, and sadly, there’s no pushback from companies to demand that they only offer their products at MSRP. They’re moving inventory so they don’t care, right? But it devalues the product and makes it so that someone doesn’t think getting in the car and shopping locally is worth it when they can get it cheaper straight to their door. This has been Amazon’s model for years and years. They don’t care if they take losses if they’re dominating the market. Comic shops can’t afford to do that and so they lose a lot of customers to groups like Amazon or even Barnes and Noble which still has more warehouse space and flexibility than any mom and pop shop.

Now, independent bookstores… there’s a lot of potential in those. The one in my town has a good bit of graphics for kids but not a ton in the way of teen-adult. I think you’d see way more interest in graphic storytelling for the uninitiated but I think comic shops still suffer a bit of the misconception that comics and graphic storytelling is just for kids. If someone hasn’t seen the evolution of the material and the stores that sell them over the past 30+ years then they’ll only think the shop is like whatever The Big Bang Theory tells them. I think that common misconception is why you don’t see a lot of readers in their teens up through adulthood come through as often.

No doubt, the misperceptions are still very prevalent, and it could easily be said that's why for many years, north American animation was almost entirely relegated to kiddie fare, well into the mid-90s, and it's not like even the Simpsons ever changed it enough. Let's also consider that political exploitation of animation only hinders the ability to convince older audiences why it's worth their time, just like with comics, as previously mentioned.

But if the issue of artistic merit isn't raised, how do they think they'll be able to convince most consumers no matter their age to take interest in comicdom and find what to enjoy? Why, while adventure is a great genre, I think it can still be beneficial to encourage kids/teens to learn how to find drama absorbing, though it shouldn't come at the expense of action-adventure themes DC/Marvel were built on, and must be developed organically. The same can be said of character drama and interaction, which should be foremost among heroes and civilian co-stars.

Yanes: On this note, in the past I’ve written about how comic book prices are increasing faster than inflation while book prices haven’t and video games are dirt cheap (The Increasing Cost of Being a Comic Book Fan vs. Inflation). What do you think companies can do to make comic books affordable?

Eastin: If your only goal is distraction, then sure, games give a great return on investment. I’m playing Zelda Tears of the Kingdom (finally) but that’s only because I finally spent a couple of hundred dollars on the console and then another forty on the game. Would the same cost translate to 40+ hours of comics to read? For some titles, actually… that’s possible.

Comics are turn-key fun. You don’t need a PS5 or the latest Nvidia GPU to jump in and I think that consideration gets lost in the shuffle when people try to compare the two. Games require an interface, designed to become obsolete, whereas comics can be grabbed and enjoyed immediately.

I don’t think the costs of comics are too outrageous when you see what your five dollars can actually buy you, these days, but I get it. When I bring home a stack of comics that cost me sixty bucks, I think of that as money well spent at a store I love, for stories and art that I’m going to appreciate. In some cases though, I find the current model to be insubstantial in floppy form and really wish there were another 5 pages or so to really give the book a little more oomph. (Every artist and writer just decided to stab me.)

If there should be a decrease in cost for comics for anyone, it should be for shop owners. The margins on new comics are pretty low and it’s impossible to run a store where you only offer new books which discourages buying anything new for your customers to try. Flexibility in the wholesale price would be a huge help for a lot of shops.

And here, once again, we see what's wrong with this whole picture. Even the documentarian himself sounds like he's uninterested in comics making the switch to paperback/hardcover. Sure, $5 or so may not be as costly as $40-plus for a video game cartridge or disk, but it's still insulting to the intellect if it turns out there's barely 20 pages of story inside, and when you have to spend as much as $60 to buy what could be 10 floppies that once would've just cost little more than 2 dollars for the whole lot in the Bronze Age, then it becomes ridiculous. So, while a paperback/hardcover book obviously wouldn't be much cheaper if you bought several simultaneously (and they could be pretty heavy to carry together), wouldn't that at least make for something more relaxing to spend one's pastime with? Much less strain on the hands than a joystick and keyboard too.

I do see Eastin may allude to how even older stories count as something to encourage a new reader to try out, and that's important, because why is everyone being told only brand new stories count as a "jumping on point" when the Marvel Epic Collections and the recent DC Finest archives can provide you with whole stories that could be completed at one's leisure? And why isn't anybody emulating the less politically motivated, more subtle styles writers of the times employed? Or, if it matters, why don't they take on more challenging issues without ascribing to a leftist playbook?

Yanes: While researching for this documentary, were there any facts you discovered that surprised you?

Eastin: You’re asking some dangerous questions. For both our sakes, let it go. I was never here. (smoke bomb)

This may sound shmaltzy but the biggest surprise was just how welcoming and kind shop owners, comics artists/writers, and even distributors were when I approached them. There are always exceptions but once I made clear that I respected their time it was really rare that anyone either passed on an interview or was in any way confrontational. I worried, at the start, that the toxicity of the fandom I’d seen online was more prevalent in the culture and I had just been lucky my whole life. Turns out that jerks are the minority in both the industry and the community, broadly speaking.

Oh, and I learned more about the mafia being involved with early comics distribution than I expected. Y’know, IF the mafia were even real. (I’m no rat.)

Something tells me the claim organized syndicates having connections to early delivery and distribution is exaggerated, though if there were any, I'm sure it wasn't intentional on the publisher's part. That aside, of course it's fortunate that he didn't find the kind of bad attitudes found online, though it should be noted there are bad apples abound, and even "professional" creators who engaged in poor behavior online, if anywhere, and it's a real shame they sullied comicdom, even wasting tons of energy attacking the Comicsgate campaign instead of bettering artistic merit along with their own conduct. A bad attitude coming from a creator can be a key factor in poor sales for any particular comic, and similar points can be made about movies and their actors, writers, directors and producers.

Yanes: On this note, why do you think comic shops continue to be so important to geek and nerd communities?

Eastin: The short answer is human connection. The stereotype about geeks/nerds lacking social graces and abjuring social interaction isn’t entirely baseless but that really hasn’t been my experience. Comic shops continue to be a place where they can find their new favorite thing while chatting with people who are either already familiar or just as curious as them. And while you can get a little taste of that all over the internet, we’re social creatures and face to face interaction has a significant impact on people’s moods, thinking process, etc.

The other thing to consider, for shops that order a nice wide array of offerings, you have a place that allows you to respond to art in a way that doesn’t always translate online. Not only can a cover pique your interest on a new release wall but you’re allowed to pick that art up and give it a look before you take it home and along the way see what other people might be interested in. It’s an immersive experience with the possibility of positive social re-enforcement.

A lot of people liken the comic store to a sort of “third space”. Your work and home are both spaces that you routinely switch back and forth between and the third space is the place you go to forget about the other two for a while. And for stores that have embraced community play with things like Magic the Gathering, D&D, or some form of board game night; it’s the place you go to see your friends and take a break from all your worries (to borrow from the Cheers theme).

Well I'm glad he did have a positive experience at specialty stores, but maybe he should also research how some creators have conducted their behavior online, and show the courage to acknowledge it can be damaging when they act negative for all the wrong reasons, and even go so far as to blacklist conservatives whose beliefs they don't agree with.

Yanes: When people finish watching Shopping for Superman, what do you hope they take away from the experience?

Eastin: For fans of comic shops, I hope they learn something new and walk away feeling like someone made something just for them. It’s definitely a unique film in that it considers the fanboy and the people who are new to comics in general and tries to give them both a fun hour and a half.

For people that are new to comic shops, I genuinely hope it encourages them to visit a comic book store and talk with the owners/clerks to find that perfect story for them that keeps them coming back for more. Comics aren’t just stories where super powerful people beat each other up and from one page to the next you can find inspiration, beauty, and horror in combinations you never thought possible.

My genuine hope has been that people who run comic shops feel appreciated and understand that there’s a love for what they do and what their stores offer and I hope they keep up the fight to keep their doors open!

On that, good luck, but let's be clear that it all depends on whether they're selling merit-based material that ensures their longevity, no matter the genres and themes in focus. And if Mr. Eastin's documentary doesn't have anything to say about the artistic damage the industry's seen along with moral damage, then what good does it do to focus on the sales side? It's practically cheap to just focus on the business side when even the moral and artistic side is relevant. Failure to confront what the industry did wrong artistically won't improve sales fortunes for specialty stores or anybody else, and then someday, if the industry collapses, there's no telling if anybody will admit what went wrong, and whether wokeness destroyed the medium. It'd be great if somebody filmed a documentary with a seriously objective view of the artistic side of comicdom. But alas, if past examples are any suggestion, it's unlikely such a documentary will be made.

Labels: animation, Avengers, Batman, crossoverloading, dc comics, golden calf of death, Green Lantern, history, marvel comics, msm propaganda, sales, Spider-Man, Superman, technology, X-Men

ComicBook's lecturing that Marvel villainess Mystique, one of the most prominent adversaries of the X-Men, needs to be provided with "respect", as though we don't have enough of these villainy-on-the-pedastal problems already:

Writer Chris Claremont’s tenure at Marvel is one of the most important in the history of the publisher. Claremont created boatloads of important characters for Marvel, all while the taking the X-Men and making them into the comic industry’s most popular team. Claremont’s best characters still play a massive role in the lives of the X-Men and one of those characters doesn’t actually get the respect she deserves — the shapeshifting assassin known as Mystique. Mystique has had a great couple of years. She played a key role in the X-Men’s Krakoa Era. Her longtime lesbian lover Destiny was resurrected, and the true parentage of her son Nightcrawler was revealed. Mystique and Destiny got officially married, and the character has since returned in a solo miniseries from Declan Shalvey. Mystique might seem like she’s getting her just desserts, but it’s honestly not enough.

Mystique is not just one of the most important villains in the X-Men’s long and illustrious history, but she’s also one of the most important female villains in the entire Marvel Universe. Mystique managed to be a woman arch-enemy of Marvel’s most popular team during one of its more popular phases. Mystique deserves her flowers as a Marvel great, and looking at her history shows just how awesome Mystique truly is.

So a criminal is awesome, but not a heroine, or even a reformed crook? What a groaner indeed. Why are we being lectured Mystique is "great", and all because of the wokest retcons that turned up in recent years? What's so "great" about Raven Darkholme and even Irene Adler that isn't so great about Rogue, who was once depicted as a protege of Mystique before reforming?

It goes without saying the columnist is blurring the differences between fiction and reality by lecturing us that a non-existant character is the one who "managed" to become one of the X-Men's most formidable foes, rather than Claremont succeeding in writing a talented story where she did.

Mystique first appeared in Ms. Marvel #16 back in 1978, four years after Giant-Size X-Men #1 made mutants important again. Mystique wouldn’t appear in the X-Men books for a little bit after this, showing up as the leader of a new Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, one that counted her, Destiny, Blob, Toad, Avalanche, Pyro, and other lesser known members like Sabre. Mystique’s Brotherhood became one of the more iconic versions of the evil team, and immediately showed that Mystique was a villain to watch out for. She jumped into the lead of the foremost X-Men villains and she stayed there for years, eventually getting the Brotherhood deputized by the federal government of the US as the Freedom Force, and the group played a huge role in the X-Men’s stories.

As the years went on, more was revealed about Mystique’s past, for example her rather advanced age, and it all showed just how important she was to the history of mutants in general. Mystique and Destiny found each other at the end of the 19th century and made for a formidable force in events. Destiny’s precognitive abilities led them to where they needed to be and Mystique’s powers and fighting skills always allowed them to influence events. Mystique was a major player in the black ops and mutant worlds for decades. She’s been everything from a lackey — like the time she worked for Sinister to destroy the X-Men from within and take Rogue away from the team — or as the mastermind, like her long tenure at the head of the Brotherhood. She was a legitimate power player on Krakoa once Destiny was resurrected, and stands as one of the foremost bisexual characters in comics.

Apparently, that must be the reason the columnist considers her such a big deal, and "important" to mutant "history". So it's not so much a matter of merit as it is a matter of political bias.

There are villains with more stature in the Marvel Universe that haven’t been nearly as important as Mystique has. Claremont used Mystique as one of the main X-Men villains from the early ’80s until the Outback Era at least, with the character constantly striking at the team. She’s been established as a major player in the history of the mutant race. She’s one of the first women to lead a major Marvel villains team. She’s a perfect villain in a variety of roles — she’s a great master manipulator, a great black ops hero/villain, an awesome archenemy — her time as one of Wolverine’s main villain during the Jason Aaron years doesn’t get enough credit, great as a solo villain or part of a team, and she has several stints on X-teams that are a lot of fun, especially her time with X-Factor in the mid ’90s, a generally underrated time for the team. Mystique even fits outside of the mutant side of the Marvel Universe, her history with Carol Danvers giving her an in with Marvel’s most formidable team, the Avengers. There are villains who are much more popular than Mystique who don’t have a tenth of the utility.

There are heroes and even civilian co-stars who don't have a 10th of the attention given to any villain, and the writer's wasting tons of page bytes gushing over a character who was conceived as a criminal. Even Mary Jane Watson doesn't get this kind of positive praise today. I'm sorry, but this is insulting to the intellect, and since they seem to be making a big deal out of a lesbian couple leading lives of crime, one can only wonder if a male gay couple would've lasted as long in the same roles, recalling there was a time in the past century when the entertainment industry was far more willing to depict lesbians as criminals than homosexual men? It's also telling the writer cites the stories of a woke writer like Aaron, after all the horrible, politically motivated writing he produced for Thor, as something to admire. That says all you need to know the columnist isn't serious.

And it's not Carol Danvers who gave Mystique an "in" with series other than X-Men, but Claremont as a writer. If memory serves, Sabretooth originally appeared Iron Fist's Bronze Age stories, to which Claremont had some writing credits, and later went on to appear in the X-Men, also as an adversary for Wolverine. Now that I think of it, the columnist doesn't clearly thank Claremont for any of that so much as he does fawn over a villainess as though that alone is fun.

Mystique is a character that doesn’t come along very often. It’s rare to find a character who is so useful in so many types of stories. Calling Mystique underappreciated may seem an exaggeration — she’s a beloved X-Men character — but it’s also a true statement. Mystique can be an A-list villain for basically any Marvel hero out there. That’s extremely rare, and that’s before Destiny is even entered into the equation. Mystique is a character who deserves the spotlight all the time.

Tell us about it. There's plenty of heroic minor characters who don't come along often in creation by their past writers and artists, including the Silver Age Atom and his lady co-star Jean Loring, and all they get today is abuse. And we're supposed to find a bunch of villains something to party about? Shame.

Mystique is in a class all her own. She can stand tall in any kind of story she’s in, and it’s about time that Marvel actually realized that. Mystique gained a lot of popularity from her live-action renditions by Rebecca Romijn and Jennifer Lawrence, making her one of the more recognizable mutants out there. She’s a character that Marvel could build around, and should never be anything less than an A-list character. Here’s how great Mystique is — she was a major part of the Krakoa Era, but no one ever complained about how important she was, whereas people got sick of Mister Sinister, another villain that played a huge role in the Krakoa Era.

Mystique has decades of amazing stories under her belt and the kind of history that allows her an in with just about any character out there. Marvel got as popular as they have because they were able to identify the characters that had the most potential and put them forward. Mystique is a character on this level, and Marvel can easily make her into a superstar in the years to come if they play their cards right.

They haven't played them right for a quarter century now. Something many of these ideologues aren't willing to admit. Nor do they recognize it's the writing merit that makes a character "stand tall", which could explain why whatever mention Claremont gets here, it's so dumbed down. And then, in another silly reference, the columnist appears to be making illogical distinctions by claiming nobody cared about Mr. Sinister in the same run. All without clearly acknowledging the writing merit, or lack thereof. It's also hilarious how the columnist talks about "identifying" fictional characters with potential, but not talented writers who can realize said potential. If it hadn't been for Claremont's efforts in the past, who knows if the X-Men would've regained popularity? There was one commentor who responded to the puff piece, and said:

Well they ruined Mystique after the Blue Origins retcon. They changed her powers, her motivations, binned her connection to Rogue as something unsubstantial, made her a victim of her now out of character wife and took away her motherhood to make her a father. This is why she is not selling. Claremont ruined her for his own petty games to beat out Austen while being greedy and ignoring the bigger picture. If they stubbornly won't fix her and undo this retcon then she is redundant. Maybe they can focus on Selene instead?

I don't think Claremont's the one responsible, though his writing talents certainly declined over the years. But a valid point's made about the petty retcons forced upon the Marvel universe post-2000, and the gushing over characters created as criminals as something to celebrate has long gotten way out of hand. This is practically why mainstream superhero fare is losing readership. If we're not being asked to care about heroes and their co-stars, and all that matters is villains, who didn't usually get "character growth" as a focus years before, that's disturbing, and sets a very poor example that's sadly become very common today. Unfortunately, there's no chance even now that anybody's going to put a more serious emphasis on why heroes and civilian co-stars should be admired, foremost courtesy of the writing talent. Though it does explain why specialty news coverage of comicdom has become so poor.

Labels: golden calf of LGBT, golden calf of villainy, history, marvel comics, moonbat writers, msm propaganda, X-Men